Category: Painting

As an artist and generally curious person, I am always looking for ways to learn and my preferred medium right now is online. There’s a wealth of information on the ‘interwebs’ and people are constantly sharing new and even old ideas through their content.

Bob Ross was a national treasure. He made you believe that painting was an attainable endeavor. I’ve actually never tried to paint from one of his tutorial videos, I merely watched the show as entertainment. Ross was encouraging about the learning process and confident in the ability of anyone who wanted to paint. Granted, his paintings weren’t the most creative and some might argue that they were formulaic, but it doesn’t negate the magic of seeing a snow-capped mountain appear before your eyes within minutes. I think it’s a special trait of an educator, to capture someone’s attention and inspire them.

Bob Ross was ‘THAT DUDE’ and his work is a testament to the power of media and education.

Barcelona, Spain—It was a warmish morning. I had just purchased a museum pass to visit multiple museums and I was ready to plot out my next several days. I sat down on a bench on a sidewalk and was engrossed in the museum pass booklet; toggling between it and the city map, trying to plan a sensible route. After several minutes, an elderly man walked in front of where I was sitting and spit on the sidewalk directly in front of me. My first response was, “Gross!” It took me several minutes before I realized what had happened. It was racially or culturally motivated.

It’s an insult of the worst kind and I almost missed it. It’s a universal passive aggressive sign of disrespect and disgust. Usually it’s in direct response of something or someone that you’re familiar with. I think everyone encounters people at some point in their lives and think, “This fool has lost his mind!” Well, I thought that (it was my natural reaction) but as I sat there for several minutes, wondering about the mind of a person who would do something like that. Don’t get me wrong, I was less surprised than curious. The irony of it all is that my purpose for being in Barcelona is to understand its people and culture.

That single action made a significant impression on me and shaped my time in Barcelona. As I continue to study art in other cultures, I’m learning that it’s imperative to make connections with every aspect of life of a place. For instance, history is critical when trying to understand people…so is religion, and politics, and family, and media.

Everything is connected.

People’s ideology is shaped by their experience and contributes to how they perceive others so having an understanding of all cultural aspects is going to help me understand why people do the things they do, why they create and how they communicate.

A couple of days later, I revisited the Arc de Triomf. It was my second attempt. The first time was on a weekend and it was crowded. The second time was less crowded but something was happening. There was a large crowd gathered on the mall waving the flag of Catalonia.

The rest of my time in Barcelona was fruitful. I visited the Picasso Museum and saw a lot of his early work. Picasso was one of those artists who was always working, always creating. It’s fun to look at his early work to try to identify stylistic clues characteristic of his later work. I also visited the Joan Miró Foundation. It was fantastic! His work is thoughtfully whimsical and inventive. I’ve never seen more than a few pieces at a time so it was a treat to be able to see multiple works at various stages of his career.

While I was disappointed by how I was treated in Barcelona, I decided to consider it a teachable moment. It only affirms the necessity of intercultural education. It wasn’t the first time, nor will it be the last. At least I learned something.

After two long days of traveling from Tokyo, I finally landed in Cape Town on New Year’s Day. I ‘celebrated’ on a flight from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to Cape Town, and by ‘celebrate’ I mean I had a nightmare that the plane was plummeting from the sky. Ah, fun times. It took me a couple of days to get acclimated but I’m back on schedule and excited about being in Cape Town for a bit. The weather is lovely, there is a lot to see and they have a vibrant arts scene. For a relatively young place, there is a lot of critical history that will be fun to explore from the inside.

I have been creating small pieces as color studies for larger works when I get back to my studio in New York. How is the essence of a place captured in color? This is one of the questions I’m asking as I conduct these studies. Color plays an integral role in how we perceive ideas, our memory and is tied to emotional and psychological experiences. Being intentional about color is important to me because it helps me to be effective in how I guide the design.

I had to be picky about selecting materials for my ‘traveling studio’. The sole criterion was low-maintenance. It was a tough decision and I’m not even sure what I’ll create with these things, but here’s what I brought: